Combined Lifestyle Intervention to reduce overweight at the workplace: opinions of stakeholders

BACKGROUND: Overweight is a risk factor for employee health and sustainable employability. Multifactorial interventions, addressing both the employee's individual lifestyle and the work environment, are expected to be most effective in overweight reduction. In the Netherlands, primary care patients with overweight are referred to Combined Lifestyle Interventions (CLI), but this is not yet common in occupational health. This study explores the attitudes, intentions and perceived facilitators and barriers of three groups of stakeholders (employees, employers and occupational physicians (OP's)). METHODS: A cross-sectional survey focusing on attitudes, barriers and facilitators was conducted among a convenience sample of, varying in age and gender, Dutch OPs (n = 267), employers (n = 401) and employees (n = 1,023) in 2021/2022. RESULTS: Preliminary results indicate that 32% of the employers would offer CLIs if accessible and 25% of the overweight employees intend to participate in a CLI. For employers, the main reasons to offer a CLI were reduction of sick leave (42%) and good employment practice (37%), barriers were the conviction that employees would not be interested (33%), lack of finance (21%) and lack of time (21%). Employee's main reason for attending was boost for good lifestyle (27%), facilitators were alignment with working hours (24%) and employer's payment for the CLI (25%). Barriers were ‘I already do enough for my health’ (22%). The main barriers for OPs to refer to a CLI were lack of knowledge (66%) and a preference for known professionals (40%), while a facilitator was having more time during their consultations. CONCLUSIONS: Although not yet common in the Netherlands, a relative large portion of participating employers is willing to invest in lifestyle interventions to reduce overweight. The shared barrier of lack of time needs to be tackled in combination with strengthening of attitudes and facilitators to achieve a successful CLI implementation. KEY MESSAGES: • Employers are willing to invest in a combined lifestyle intervention to reduce or prevent employee’s overweight. • Implementation requires sufficient time for referral and participation, employers to pay and OPs to be informed about the combined lifestyle intervention.